Autumn Tears And Winter Leaves

Blankly analysing the clouds as they spiralled above her head, Lawen vacantly dangled one leg over the roundabout her body was draped across. Suppressing the sighs that stormed her throat, she gave herself one violent push to spin reality into dishevelment. It had been a week since she had unburdened herself of that tainted engagement ring but life was still jammed in a monotonous routine. That day Lawen had cast her ring into the sea, she'd carved fairytale possibilities in rainbow paint across the deeper caverns of her mind. She'd honestly believed with a full-pledged, naive heart that as soon as the ring left her grasp, she'd release herself from her past. Yet, she'd discovered with a downcast heart, she was shackled to it with a tighter passion than before with nothing to curl her reminiscence around anymore.

Cloaking her eyes with her arm, Lawen vainly attempted to neutralise the thoughts that saturated her mind. Her intense efforts were accompanied by a chorus of frustrated groans as those thoughts only projected slideshow memories upon the backs of her eyelids. All she wanted to do was leave the past in some abandoned skip and focus on the sunshine tomorrows that Torben was adamant existed in the horizon for her. The epiphany was striking her with rampant boldness that, without a history, you're only a smudged blur on the sleeve of existence.

"You're going to freeze out here." a voice stated, rescuing Lawen from her reverie. Flicking her gaze upwards, Lawen found herself looking up at Conall. He offered her a weakened smile before he knelt beside her to wrap a blanket around her chilled form. As he finished, Conall leant back against one of the rails of the roundabout next to Lawen. Chewing his lip into silence, he scrutinized the scenery before he lowered his gaze to Lawen. "How you feeling?" he asked gently.

"Do you want the truth or an optimistic lie?" Lawen asked, subtly shaking her head. Wordlessly, Conall leaned across to her and place a finger under her trembling chin to calm it. He watched patiently from the distance Lawen held him with her closed eyes as she grappled with the emotions that she was encasing in tear-shaped bottles inside.

"I know it's hard," Conall murmured. "God knows what you're going through. But we're all here for you. And we all love you."

Flickering her eyes open, Lawen gazed up at Conall with dampened eyes. "What did I ever do to deserve you guys?" she asked in a spectral voice.

"You must have done something incredible in a past life." Conall answered with a mitigated smile as he dashed away the tears that had plunged from Lawen's eyes.

Lawen let a remote smile mould her lips into clouded shades of happiness as she forced her tears into a retreat by clamping her eyes shut. "I must have done," she breathed, unfurling her eyes again. "But I thought you said I was a butterfly in a past life."

"You were," Conall insisted, grinning. "That doesn't mean you weren't a good butterfly though." Pulling vaguely at the blanket around Lawen, he added, "You know, looking out for the other butterflies, saving all the nectar for them..."

Lawen stretched a hand up and placed it softly against Conall's cheek. "You've put way too much thought into this, darling," she teased. "I think someone needs a hobby." She traced her gaze across Conall's flushing face with a feeble smile. Confusion glided its hand across Lawen's face as Conall muted his flush to offer an emboldened smile. "What?" she asked.

"That's the first time I've seen you smile in months," Conall answered. "I was beginning to abandon faith."

Twisting her gaze away from Conall, Lawen pressed her lips together. "I've been a bitch to live with, haven't I?"

"Well, I wouldn't exactly..." Lawen vaulted her gaze back to Conall with an expression carved from unimpressed stonework that caused him to a let laugh slip from his lips. "OK, you've been a grade A bitch." Thinking, Conall shook his head, "A grade A+ bitch actually with an honours degree in moodiness."

Tapping Conall's arm, Lawen scowled playfully. "Watch it. I'm not completely cured yet."

"Sorry," Conall grinned, swabing his mouth with a finger. "It just slipped out. I couldn't help myself." Reflecting Lawen's softened smile, Conall watched her tug the blanket up to her chin. "We should really head into the house." Conall stated as Lawen faintly shivered.

Looking up at Conall's form crumpled with shudders, Lawen nodded and thrust herself up. As Conall edged up alongside her, she gave another diluted smile and took his hand. Her smile gained confidence as Conall gave her hand a fleeting but comforting squeeze before leading her into the house.

With a minute smile nestled upon her face, Lawen curled her pyjama-clad form around a tub of ice cream. Vacantly sensing her band-mates dotted around the room, she injected her broken heart with sugar and focused her attention on the rapidly shifting pictures on the television.

"Ugh," Pasco groaned as Beyonce flashed upon the screen. "I'm sorry, darling, but I don't know what the hell you were thinking with that pink... thing. This isn't a strip club, sweetie. You can put your arse away."

"I don't know," Conall argued. "I quite like it."

"You would," Lawen retorted, almost bitterly. "You're male."

As Conall's head jerked across to Lawen, attempting to decipher whether that was an attack upon him or men in general, Pasco crawled across the carpet, beneath his gaze. He knelt in front of Lawen and raised her spoon-filled hand to her mouth. "It's all right, Conall," he soothed. "She's just hormonal. Come on now, precious. Stuff yourself with sugar now. It makes everything better. There."

With a weak laugh, Lawen pushed Pasco back until he fell against the carpet with a yelp. "I'm not hormonal." she corrected.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Madam," Pasco apologised with a grin. "You're just misunderstood."

"Bite me." Lawen smirked.

"Don't tease a guy like that. I won't be able to control myself."

Lawen sighed through a resigned laugh and shifted her weight in the chair. "Someone change the channel," she pleaded. "Beyonce makes me depressed with her twig figure."

As Torben switched the television to Kerrang, he smiled across at Lawen. "You don't want to be like that, angel," he told her. "It's not natural."

"Yeah," Pasco agreed, nudging Conall. "What do you cling onto when you... "

"Pasco." Lawen said, firmly. As Pasco looked across at her with an innocent gleam in his eye, Lawen shook her head. "Darling. No."

"But I was just saying." Pasco pouted.

"No, Duck," Lawen echoed. "You were about to traumatise me. Again." Mirroring Pasco's grin. Lawen lowered her head to analyse her ice-cream. Stabbing her spoon into the centre, she carved a mound onto it.

A gentle silence coated the room with the television vaguely murmuring in the background. It was moments like this that Lawen loved the most. Lethargic evenings with her bandmates with the possibility of chance cloaking them. And, even if they didn't grasp it, they still had each other as a balm for their wounds. Raising her eyes to glaze over Pasco's bold, blue hair, Torben's gently serious expression and Conall's analytical smile, Lawen felt an epiphany hatch inside her. She may have lost one egotistical blotch in her life, but she had managed to remain supported by three punk rock angels.

Grinning back into her ice cream, Lawen drew her legs closer to her in secure comfort. It wasn't long before her eyes were hauled back up by a hope-doused voice. And, this time, it wasn't Pasco widening her eyes with shock.

"Have you ever dreamt of rock super-stardom? Think your band is the best in the universe? Well, Kerrang are offering you the chance to show the world what you're made of. Pop-punk giants, Green Day, are about to launch their UK tour and are looking for a local band to support them. Not only will you get the chance to rub shoulders with one of the world's greatest bands, you'll also be able to rock out across the whole of the UK. Auditions are being held... "

The television was muted with an ecstasy-laced, stunned silence. Unsure of what they had just heard, the band gawped at each other in disbelief. This could be the moment they'd all be battling for.